What if part of the answer to our building problem is actually to build less?

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‘No-build’ and ‘low-build’ solutions are a relatively cheap and simple way to reduce the size of the housing waiting list and shrink the size of the infrastructure pipeline, writes Beth West

The magnitude of the task of building 1.5 million homes by the end of the parliament and the £785bn to be delivered by the 10-year infrastructure strategy is breathtaking in its ambition. Is it possible to deliver all of this on this timescale? Do we have the resources to deliver this, even if the money and the planning approvals are there?

For as long as I can remember, we have been talking about both supply chain shortages and and a shrinking workforce as many people are nearing retirement age. Yet we are carrying on delivering things the way that we have always done them, and politicians of every stripe continue to make bold announcements about how they will solve our challenges – and yet continue not to deliver. Many of the challenges we face today are growing rather than being resolved, so doing things the same way clearly isn’t working.

What if we tackle these issues by looking at this through a different lens? Instead of building big, what if we challenge ourselves to build as little as we possibly can in order to achieve our desired outcomes?

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